Dublin Airport to Trial New Honesty-Based Food Offer

Dublin Airport has teamed up with Marqette to trial a new honesty-based food and beverage take-away offer at Terminal 1. A trial Honest Eats Co fridge will be installed at Marqette’s airside location in T1 (above) later this month stocked with a selection of sandwiches, wraps, salads, pastries, snacks and drinks.

Passengers will pick the items they want, scan them and pay for them via a cashless self-service checkout that accepts cards and mobile payment applications. The fridge unit, which will have a range of up to 73 different food and drink products, texts Marqette’s kitchens as sales are made to ensure that stock levels will be properly maintained.

“We are constantly seeking to improve the passenger experience at Dublin Airport and are delighted to be working with Marqette to trial the new Honest Eats concept,” said Vincent Harrison, Managing Director, Dublin Airport.

“Honest Eats has the potential to work really well in an airport setting where passengers in a hurry want to grab high quality food and drink on the go,” said Michael J Wright, Owner, Marqette. “We are really excited to be working with Dublin Airport to test this new concept.”

Mayo-based retail software company CBE is supplying the software for the Honest Eats trial and this will provide for a simple and efficient payment system for passengers. The initial trial will last for about four weeks and data from the trial will be shared with participants in the upcoming InspireFest Conference in Dublin as part of a mini-hack competition to further refine and improve the Honest Eats concept.

Dublin Airport has operated an honesty payment system for its Plane Water brand since 2014 and has honesty water stations in several airside locations across both terminals. The Plane Water honesty payment initiative was an instant success and has since been copied by several other airports. Typically, about 92% of passengers pay the €1 charge for a 500ml bottle of water.

The initial trial Honest Eats outlet will be situated beside Marqette’s existing café in T1, but the longer-term plan is that small Honest Eats units could be located across Dublin Airport in areas that need a quality food and beverage offer but don’t have the space for a full café.

“We are effectively testing a minimum viable version of the Honest Eats concept and we hope that data from the trial, coupled with the collective brain power of InspireFest attendees, will allow Dublin Airport and Marqette to develop this idea into a fully developed proposition that could be used both here in Dublin and potentially at other airports globally,” added Vincent Harrison.

Attendees at InspireFest who participate in the competition are being asked for ideas on how to make the payment system as frictionless as possible, while ensuring that the technology can be easily monitored and that there is scope for customer assistance even though the unit will not be staffed.

The winning team from InspireFest, which is being held in Dublin on 21st-22nd June 2018, will receive two return tickets to Hong Kong from Cathay Pacific.

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Michael Flood is the Editor of Ireland's leading travel industry publication, Irish Travel Trade News. With more than 35 years experience, he has accumulated an in-depth knowledge of the airline industry and the travel and tourism world.